No. 2913

Eggs on a Dish, Creole Style

Œufs sur le Plat a la Creole

Fry colorless in oil one tablespoonful of chopped onions, as much finely cut-up hot pepper, a quarter of a clove of crushed garlic and a peeled tomato cut in two, pressed out, then divided into small squares; simmer, reduce, and when of a sufficient consistency add two tablespoonfuls of cooked rice, salt and cayenne pepper. With this preparation cover the bottom of a dish fit for the oven; break over the eggs carefully, keeping the yolks entire, pour on melted butter, season with salt on the white of the eggs, and in the center of the yolk put a little pepper, and cook in a moderate oven.

← No. 2912 Eggs on a Dish, Conde Eggs & Omelets No. 2914 Eggs on a Dish, English Style →

For the Modern Kitchen Do not make this as written.

Ranhofer's shirred eggs on a Creole base of onion, hot pepper, garlic, tomato and rice. The whole dish takes about ten minutes once the sauce is made, and the only real difficulty is stopping while the yolks are still soft.

The hinge: pull them earlySet eggs carry over in a hot gratin dish. Take them out when the whites are just barely set and the yolks still tremble. Ranhofer says only "a moderate oven" and gives no temperature or time; a modern equivalent is usually taken as somewhere around 350F, and the eggs will need only a few minutes, not cooking until firm.
Fry colorlessThis means sweat the onion in oil over low heat without letting it take any color at all. Browning would put a caramel note into what is meant to be a clean, sharp red base.
Quantities and yieldThe quantities are small: one tablespoon of onion, one tomato and two tablespoons of rice make only enough base to line a small dish. Ranhofer does not say how many eggs are broken over it, so the number of servings is a matter of inference; multiply straight up for more.
The hot pepperRanhofer does not name a variety. A fresh long red or green chile, seeded, is in keeping; the cayenne added at the end is separate seasoning, so go lightly on both until you have tasted the base.
The tomatoPeeled, halved, squeezed of seeds and juice, then diced. Squeezing matters more than it sounds, since the base has to reduce to a spreadable consistency rather than flood the dish and poach the eggs from below.
Cooked riceLeftover plain long-grain rice, cooled. It is there to bind and bulk the base, not to be a rice dish, so keep to the stated two tablespoons or the eggs will sit on a dry cushion.
The dish itself"A dish fit for the oven" points to a shallow eared gratin dish or small cast-iron pan. Shallow is the point: a deep dish sets the whites unevenly and overcooks the yolks. Ranhofer does not say to butter the dish -- the melted butter goes over the eggs.
Seasoning placementSalt on the whites only and a speck of pepper on each yolk is deliberate. Salt sprinkled directly on a raw yolk mottles the surface with pale spots before it cooks.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York, published The Epicurean in 1894 as a comprehensive record of the restaurant's kitchen, running to well over three thousand numbered recipes; this is one of a long run of oeufs sur le plat variations, each distinguished only by what lines the dish. "A la Creole" in nineteenth-century French-American kitchens was a shorthand garnish rather than a strict regional citation, generally understood to mean tomato with onion, garlic, sweet or hot pepper and often rice - the New Orleans repertoire reduced to a formula a French-trained brigade could execute anywhere. Ranhofer worked in the classical garnish system, where a named preparation was a fixed set of components that could be attached to eggs, fish or chicken alike, which is why the same Creole base turns up throughout the book. Shirred eggs of this kind were a staple of American hotel and restaurant breakfast service, cooked and sent to table in the same small dish, and the form survives largely unchanged in the eggs baked in cast iron still served today.